Breaking the chains, winning the games, and saving Western Civilization.

Sunday, October 27, 2013

The Buyer's Market

Game continues to break into the mainstream, as evidenced by this piece in the Sydney Morning Herald, entitled Why women lose the dating game. It even features citations from Dalrock as well as Susan Walsh:

He barely had a date through much of his 20s and gave up on women. But then he spent time overseas, gained more confidence, learnt how to dress well and hit his early 30s. ''I suddenly started to get asked out by women, aged 19 through to 40. The floodgates burst open for me. I actually dated five women at once, amazing my flatmates by often bedding three to four of my casual dates each week. It is a great time as a male in your 30s, when you start getting more female attention and sex than you could ever have dreamt of in your 20s.''

That's when some men start behaving very badly - as the manosphere clearly shows. These internet sites are not for the faint-hearted. The voices are often crude and misogynist. But they tell it as they see it. There is Greenlander, an apparently successful engineer in his late 30s. In his early adult life, he was unable to ''get the time of day from women''. Now he's interested only in women under 27.

''The women I know in their early 30s are just delusional,'' he says. ''I sometimes seduce them and sleep with them just because I know how to play them so well. It's just too easy. They're tired of the cock carousel and they see a guy like me as the perfect beta to settle down with before their eggs dry out … when I get tired of them I just delete their numbers from my cell phone and stop taking their calls … It doesn't really hurt them that much: at this point they're used to pump & dump!''

It's easy to dismiss such bile but Greenlander's analysis is echoed by many Australian singles, both male and female.

''It's wall-to-wall arseholes out there,'' reports Penny, a 31-year-old lawyer. She is stunned by how hard it is to meet suitable men willing to commit. ''I'm horrified by the number of gorgeous, independent and successful women my age who can't meet a decent man.''

Penny acknowledges part of the problem is her own expectations - that her generation of women was brought up wanting too much. ''We were told we were special, we could do anything and the world was our oyster.'' And having spent her 20s dating alpha males, she expected them to be still around when she finally decided to get serious.

But these men go fast, many fishing outside their pond. The most attractive, successful men can take their pick from women their own age or from the Naomis, the younger women who are happy to settle early. Almost one in three degree-educated 35-year-old men marries or lives with women aged 30 or under, according to income, housing and marriage surveys by the Bureau of Statistics.

''I can't believe how many men my age are only interested in younger women,'' wails Gail, a 34-year-old advertising executive as she describes her first search through men's profiles on the RSVP internet dating site. She is shocked to find many mid-30s men have set up their profiles to refuse mail from women their own age.

Talking to many women like her, it's intriguing how many look back on past relationships where they let good men get away because they weren't ready. American journalist Kate Bolick wrote recently in The Atlantic about breaking off her three-year relationship with a man she described as ''intelligent, good-looking, loyal and kind''. She acknowledged ''there was no good reason to end things'', yet, at the time, she was convinced something was missing in the relationship. That was 11 years ago. She's is now 39 and facing grim choices.

''We arrived at the top of the staircase,'' Bolick wrote, ''finally ready to start our lives, only to discover a cavernous room at the tail end of a party, most of the men gone already, some having never shown up - and those who remain are leering by the cheese table, or are, you know, the ones you don't want to go out with.''

So, many women are missing out on their fairytale ending - their assumption that when the time was right the dream man would be waiting. The 30s are worrying years for high-achieving women who long for marriage and children - of course, not all do - as they face their rapidly closing reproductive window surrounded by men who see no rush to settle down.

One thing that tends to confuse those looking superficially at the matter is that most women, even in their late 30s, are able to find partners. But what tends to escape the attention of those superficial observers is that the men for whom the women are settling in their 30s and 40s tend to be of distinctly lower quality than the men that were pursuing them in their middle and late 20s. If you see a high caliber married man in his 40s or 50s who is married to a woman within a few years of his age, in most cases you will learn that they married when he was in his 20s. One seldom sees a high caliber married man that age who is engaged to a woman who is within five years of his age, as the statistics increasingly demonstrate.

This is why divorced men tend to do well among women approaching the Beauty Wall. Since divorce downgrades their MMV, they still have many of the SMV characteristics that women find attractive, but they possess lower marital value due to the greater baggage and higher relationship risk they represent. So, the older women retain access to the men their age the younger women find less interesting from the relationship perspective.

21 comments:

A Divorced Man who has a high enough SMV otherwise - I don't think the Divorce does anything negative to his market value

You can easily dismiss the first wife as : "bitches be crazy", she "didn't understand a man like me"

I'm do tired of this idea you are supposed to placate these thirty-something girls who spent their twenties whoring, sucking, and flaking and suddenly are as chaste as Sister Mary come 35 and are going to screen you for whether you're "Marriage Material"

Marriage, as Tomassi explains, is a thoroughly female convention. One Man restricted to One Woman benefits a Woman, never the Man in such a relationship. Men are biologically interested in variety. Yet when you marry you the Man are supposed to agree to be Restricted to One Pussy. Against all things natural in male biology.

Pray tell, how is a high SMV man supposed to possibly retain the superior Dominance and Control over his woman that is what actually attracted her to begin with - when SHE is now supposedly controlling his cock and thereby the entire relationship. You want sex, do this this and this. You want sex? You are not making me feel appreciated enough. You want sex? I am no longer as attracted to you as a woman as I once was because you actually committed to only me... and your high value and my female competition anxiety is disappearing before my very eyes

The man talking about his pump-and-dumps is emitting "bile." The girl talking about how she spent her 20s riding the cock carousel -- and surely engaging in the female version of the pump-and-dump, giving out fake numbers, using orbiters as emotional tampons and couch carriers, and LJBFing guys -- isn't, of course.

At least they're starting to acknowledge that part of the problem, though. I don't think an article like this a year ago would have been that honest about women's responsibility in all this. If girls stayed off the carousel and held out for rings, those guys would have married them in their 20s and none of this would be happening.

I don't know exactly how pertinent it is to the topic, but check out the careers listed here. The man is an engineer: he designs or builds things. The girls are an advertising executive, a journalist, and a lawyer: all mostly make-work jobs. They may not be easy jobs, and they may work very hard at them, but ultimately they don't add to the society's level of food, housing, machines, household products, or anything else that people can't live without. They traded their most valuable years, and most or all of their fertility, to produce work which no one would miss if it disappeared tomorrow. No wonder they're depressed.

"Talking to many women like her, it's intriguing how many look back on past relationships where they let good men get away because they weren't ready. American journalist Kate Bolick wrote recently in The Atlantic about breaking off her three-year relationship with a man she described as ''intelligent, good-looking, loyal and kind''. She acknowledged ''there was no good reason to end things'', yet, at the time, she was convinced something was missing in the relationship. That was 11 years ago. She's is now 39 and facing grim choices."

hahahahahahahhaah, you reap what you sow. Doubt it will ever settle in for the younger ones though, still being told to do what they want and be "liberated".

Love the double standards about whoring that cail mentioned above too. I've known no end of women that whine men use them only for sex, yet have no problems using men just for emotions and resources.

Who in their right mind and of sound financial standing, when given a choice between a good and solid low-mileage BMW 3-series or a 15 year old Crown Victoria ACME Yellow Cabs no longer wants, will choose the latter?

There seem to be parallel, complementary cognitive biases operating among men and women in the dating marketplace. For women, there is a general mentality of abundance, that they can afford to fritter away opportunities and "not settle" because as Kate Bolick put it, "that there would always be men we wanted to marry, we took on faith."

On the other side, game practitioners are constantly warning men against the natural tendency towards a mentality of scarcity, telling them to internalize the notion that there are more girls on the girl tree and you don't have to commit too early or put up with crap because you think you can't get someone else. It is bizarre to learn that for all their talk about "commitment," many women are more turned on by their man when they get the sense that he could have other girls if he wanted them.

This all follows from the Rollo chart - young women begin their dating eligibility with huge amounts of power and optionality, whereas all but a select few young men are on the bottom of the food chain. Attitudes are formed that become difficult to change without serious self-work. Dagonet at The Quest for 50 recently wrote about this, that as a recovering beta he always has a bit of that self-loathing scarcity whenever he is rejected or in one case when a woman rejected him for extending their fling to an LTR.

There is no law of nature or society that says it all has to work out - if you get caught making a bad decision playing your odds the wrong way, you may wind up with someone you're not well matched with when you could have had better (e.g. a dude who locks down the first girl who looks at him twice), or conversely you may never get another opportunity with someone who wants to commit to you (Kate Bolick).

-I've started to see this procession of 30-something spinsters in my peripheral social circle. It's important to understand that some of them, yes, are recovering carousel riders (LOVE the fact that the Sydney paper printed the term uncensored) who are on the hunt for their beta bux. However, others are often career gals who put a lot of time into the job, probably didn't have a lot of girl game, and really didn't date (not even much hooking up) in their prime 20's years.

They are more sympathetic than slash-and-burn sluts, but they have in fact made the same category of mistake - they have never developed their relationship skills or their "product value" as a girlfriend or a prospective wife.

-"But these men go fast, many fishing outside their pond" - it is very funny how insistent women will be about asserting who is in whose "league" or "pond," it's one major element of female-imperative rhetoric controlling the frame of dating discussion. It's also subject to the collective solipsism, since women will defend their right to exercise hypergamous mating to men of better education or income than them, but at the same time insist that men must stay in their "pond" and accuse them of insecurity or predatory motivation for dating a younger or less "educated" woman.

badgehut: It is bizarre to learn that for all their talk about "commitment," many women are more turned on by their man when they get the sense that he could have other girls if he wanted them.

The desire for "commitment" and arousal by competition is pretty basic. A woman wants to lock down the best provider/producer, as measured by his ability to attract mates. If she senses her grip loosening, she has to step up her game. As noted in another thread, the "economics" of mating does contribute to sexual interest.

-"But these men go fast, many fishing outside their pond" - it is very funny how insistent women will be about asserting who is in whose "league" or "pond," it's one major element of female-imperative rhetoric controlling the frame of dating discussion.

Yeah, as I read about poor 31-year old Penny and 34-year old Gail, I found myself wondering if their 25-year old selves dated any men over 30. And if you called them out on it, would they have tried to excuse themselves by complaining the "boys" in their 20's were too immature or unsophisticated.

If you see a high caliber married man in his 40s or 50s who is married to a woman within a few years of his age, in most cases you will learn that they married when he was in his 20s.

I'm closer to 50 than to 40 now, and I'm two years older than my wife. We started dating when she was 24, and married when she was 26.

xyz: You can easily dismiss the first wife as : "bitches be crazy", she "didn't understand a man like me"

But just as easily: "He failed to dominate her," "he chooses poorly," etc. And since there is often alimony, child support, and/or matters of custody attached to a failed marriage, an otherwise high-SMV divorced man can be downgraded for still being leashed in the long term to his ex-wife.

Against all things natural in male biology.

It's curious how often the "natural" argument is brought up in favor of promiscuity. It's also natural in human biology to eat oneself to morbid obesity and be slothful in an environment of abundance, to live in squalor, to deprive others of property through force or stealth, to lie, to assault, and to murder. Few, if any, people would rely on the "natural" argument to defend those things, yet probably alone among the human vices it is not infrequently employed in defense of catering to sexual behavior. The female version is hypergamy: women not infrequently use the "natural" argument to defend breaking fidelity and trading up to "superior" men.

badgerhut: They are more sympathetic than slash-and-burn sluts, but they have in fact made the same category of mistake - they have never developed their relationship skills or their "product value" as a girlfriend or a prospective wife.

It's quite likely their mothers failed to teach them these skills. Reminds me of something I heard in an anthropology class: girls naturally grow up to be civilized women, but boys need to be taught how to be civilized men. Given what we're observing with women's behavior in the current relationship marketplace, that does not seem to be the case at all.

It does seem that, as you say, men have a natural assumption of scarcity, while women naturally assume abundance. Our society reinforces that for women, but for men, assuming scarcity seems to be largely innate. It makes sense biologically: eggs are scarce and sperm are plentiful. Animal males don't suffer from it though; a rooster or bull assumes that every female that comes into his herd belongs to him. Only human males have the ability to doubt themselves, I guess.

I was heartened by this line: "the Naomis, the younger women who are happy to settle early." They didn't dwell on that, but if there is a significant number of younger women who have learned from the mistakes of their spinster aunts and are turning to marriage earlier, that could change things in a hurry. Only women can fix this, by staying off the carousel in the first place, and the only reasonable way for that to happen is for them to marry younger.

The male belief in scarcity of women is the pedestal worship, princess scarcity mindset. Which is perpetuated by Hollywood starting with Disney and running all the way up through the latest RomCom and even into the super hero movie where Iron Man is lucky to have Pepper Pots, and I am sure we will find out how crucial Jane Foster will be to Thor's success in a few weeks.

"This is why divorced men tend to do well among women approaching the Beauty Wall. Since divorce downgrades their MMV, they still have many of the SMV characteristics that women find attractive, but they possess lower marital value due to the greater baggage and higher relationship risk they represent. So, the older women retain access to the men their age the younger women find less interesting from the relationship perspective."

Funny, once I passed 35, women had a better opinion of divorced guys than guys like me and some of my acquaintances, who reported likewise that women they were meeting would critically question why they're not married by now, meaning what's wrong with them not have married yet, while the divorced guys didn't hear that objection.

Actually, due to hypergamy, marriage benefits most men too. Only the top males that could actually attract multiple women are hindered by monogamous marriages.

cail

"a rooster or bull assumes that every female that comes into his herd belongs to him. Only human males have the ability to doubt themselves, I guess."

Ever wonder why there's usually only one bull? The rest of the males were castrated and turned into steers, steaks and stilettos. A rather humorous example of the apex fallacy and, in the artificial farm environment, absence of living competition.

He barely had a date through much of his 20s and gave up on women. But then he spent time overseas, gained more confidence, learnt how to dress well and hit his early 30s. ''I suddenly started to get asked out by women, aged 19 through to 40. The floodgates burst open for me. I actually dated five women at once, amazing my flatmates by often bedding three to four of my casual dates each week. It is a great time as a male in your 30s, when you start getting more female attention and sex than you could ever have dreamt of in your 20s.''

It is interesting to observe a certain cast of characters who steadfastly maintain "No, this isn't happening, younger women have zero attraction to older men" but then also simultaneously display indignation about older men-younger women pairings. Why get worked up over something you believe doesn't happen?

I'm talking about High SMV as you see in comment Who cares about the masses of Deltas or bulls and steers in nature? What kind of a board is this

Stickwick - You are picking at sticks (straws)

Only what is Natural is Antifragile (Taleb, Vox will get this reference ). Marriage is anything but natural or antifragile. It is a con-job meant to protect women by restricting one "feeder cow" of a man to bleed himself dry of resources - before she chooses, after 10-15 years, to get rid of him in a one-sided divorce regime. Please wake up to reality

"Marriage" may work for a guy with a Hard 9 for a wife who has moved on to focus on different things in his life as a man. But even there, with all due respect, I find it begins to strain credulity that an actual high SMV male can be restricted to one cock for the rest of his life

That I see commenters assenting to this idea makes me question the SMV of the commenters. Gammas? Deltas?

Important Hints For Women:1. Start hunting for a husband the instant you graduate from high school. This gives you a decade or more to find the right man.2. Shop for long-term assets, especially the appreciating assets. Don't buy the faux Alpha posers.3. Once you find him, Girl Game him and get him married.4. KEEP Girl Gaming him. Marriage requires preventive maintenance.5. If your grandmother is around - or better, your great-grandmother - ask her for advice.

Which is why it happens in all societies, including the Stone Age ones, yes?

It is a con-job meant to protect women by restricting one "feeder cow" of a man to bleed himself dry of resources - before she chooses, after 10-15 years, to get rid of him in a one-sided divorce regime.

Ah, I see where your problem lies: It is the child's assumption that all things have ever been as they are today...

But even there, with all due respect, I find it begins to strain credulity that an actual high SMV male can be restricted to one cock for the rest of his life